Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Public Hearing to review and consider: 1) the introduction of Draft Ordinance No. 2014-01 entitled "An Ordinance of the City of Encinitas, California, adopting an amendment to Title 30 of the Encinitas Municipal Code to add Chapter 30.27 - Deemed Approved Alcoholic Beverage Sale Regulations and Provisions for Expanding and Intensifying Alcohol Serving Establishments, and amendments to certain Specific Plans to make reference to Chapter 30.27 of the Encinitas Municipal Code"; and 2) other related actions and activities. CASE NUMBER: 13-271 ZCA/SPA/LCPA; APPLICANT: City of Encinitas; LOCATION: Citywide. Contact Person: Planning and Building Director Murphy

Recommended Action: A) Implement a proactive enforcement program as described by staff; as part of that program, include a single point of contact for the public and identify more efficient ways to report complaints such as adding signage/branding; B) Develop metrics to help track/measure the success of proactive enforcement efforts; C) Delay adoption of the Deemed Approved Ordinance (DAO) to December 31, 2014. Once information from the proactive efforts are collected and evaluated, have the DAO returned to the Planning Commission for review in February 2015; D) Should the Council adopt draft Ordinance No. 2014-01, remove the reference "incompatible uses" under Section 30.27.010(A) attached herein as Exhibit A to Attachment 1 of the Agenda Report; E) Receive an overview of other actions taken by the City to address the concerns raised relative to impacts associated with alcohol serving businesses; F) Consider the proactive enforcement and outreach program described in the Agenda Report. Should the Council wish to implement the program, the required staffing will be presented as part of the FY2014-15 budget process in May 2014 as per previous Council direction.

How about another idea? A part-time, contract Code Enforcement Officer working Thursday through Sunday, 8pm to closing, paid for by the Encinitas Hospitality Association. If the EHA doesn't want to pay for it, give them the Deemed Approved Ordinance.

The city solution or is it the hospitality association's idea is to have the code enforcement officer inspection the bars once a month in the three summer months and then once every three months for the other seasons. Also the community residents would be required/voluntarily attend meetings with the bar owners/representatives to discuss the problems. Council - approve the deemed approved ordinance now! Stop with the placating these bar owners.

Pick a bar, bang pots outside that bar until 10 pm.( which is the legal time to make noise, after that it's prohibited), the pot banging will stop people from entering that bar and put the hurt on the bar owners pocket book. Do that night after night after night. Bang pots outside Coast Law Group. Make Marco pay attention to the problem. If he complains tell him you will go to one of the bars on the 101. Bang Pots. When their wallet hurts they'll start addressing the problem of TOO much noise.Fight fire with fire.Fight noise with more noise.

I don't live near downtown and I am disgusted with this city. I appreciate Mayor Barth stating the downtown residents are not the only ones in affected by increased noise, traffic, trash, density/crowding, and general debauchery. The complaints are coming in from all over the city.

I cannot help but wonder if this is the work of Marco Gonzales. He is chair of this so called Encinitas Hospitality Group, who were supposed to enforce the laws already on the books. They don't want to, so we citizens get to pick up yet another employee with benefits. Nice going Marco.

I don't favor hiring another full time employee. A part time code enforcement officer retired. That wasn't made clear in the staff report last time this issue came before Council.

More and more employees will be retiring as our city ages. We are going to end up paying for new employees, for retired employees, and for numerous contractors and consultants, all to do the same job. So paying three for the job of one!

Tony Kranz was correct, before. If the City Manager cannot guarantee a late night/weekend shift, then a new employee for code enforcement is unnecessary. A full time position is unnecessary in any case. The Sheriff, bar owners and Hospitality Association patrol should do their jobs.

When Council voted AGAINST hiring another FTE, before, Council and the public were told this would come back in May, with more strategic planning, and budget priority setting. Hey, it's not May, yet!

Vina wants another full time Code Enforcement Officer. He wants to beef up his "administration" and his executive powers, at taxpayers' expense. Some employees are retiring EARLY because of issues with Vina and his cabinet. To many citizens, and employees, they seem like interlopers, coming down from Sacramento, or from other non-local areas, including out-of-state, to Encinitas, to tell us what to do and how to do it, and how much to spend on doing it.

Operating expenses have been skyrocketing. The City Manager has not been doing an excellent job, but our Council is too close to him and the City Attorney to be able to have an objective perspective in their unanimous evaluations, uninformed by public opinion of these overpaid, self-interested "public servants."

Lynn is absolutely right in her assessment that some employees are retiring early because of Vina. That means they will get full pensions, as they can retire, they might just not have been ready to. With Vina at the helm, and the Council not reigning him in, many City employees are saying Fuck it, I'll retire, get my benefits and find another job.

No, they're saying they're going to retire. Unless you're in select areas like medical and pharma, there is no one hiring. Unemployment in the real world is running 15%-20%. Trust me, they're probably just planning on retiring.

As for the bar problem, how about the people of downtown getting together and picketing some of the worst offenders. That will get their attention. Unless you hit them in the wallet, they won't do anything...

If the 5 council members can't step up to the plate and do the job we elected them to do, then they all need to be recalled. They are in charge of making the decisions. NOT the city manager. Get it straight council. You oversee the city manager. Do your damn job or get out.

How come we didn't recall Stocks, Bonds, Dallagher, Guerin? A recall is a pretty serious action, I don't anybody on the council is worthy of that, and I'm pretty disappointed in the current efforts of the 5. You will have a chance to make a move in November, when the mayors new seat and the other council seat come up.

Guerin is a ladder climber as someone else posted. The only way that woman made it on the sheriff's department is because her present husband was her instructor. Otherwise, the weak thing would have never made it. He taught her how to use the system -- claim an injury and get paid disability for the rest of your life. Nice gig in the department and nice gig with Bilbray (she was totally unqualified for that position). Living off the public sector.

I will give anyone credit who votes against another full time employee. I wrote to all 5 council members, as well as Kathy Hollywood, expressing my opinion about voting against a new hire. Since I can't be at the meeting, I thought it was the best I could do. Whether they take my suggestion is another matter. I thought the Encinitas Hospitality Group was supposed to take this on? What happened, if anything? And, if they do vote for another Full time person, I hope that person will be assigned to work at night when the occurrences occur. Another daytime employee is a waste of money in this case. Just my 2 cents, and it isn't worth much these days I can assure you.

Gaspar doesn't mind taking home calls from her bar friends, so I suggest every one get her number, keep it close to your bedside, and call her at 2:00 am when you are awakened by all the drunks. If she doesn't answer, call Kranz and Muir. Seriously, this is the only way they will understand what we are going through.

Call her at 2 am?? Why?? Go bang pots outside her home at 2 am. Let neighbors hear the noise. When the sheriff arrives tell them you found those pots in the street and were moving them off to the side. Lie to the sheriffs. Then leave in your car. Go to another council persons home and bang pots until they call the sheriffs. Tell the sheriff, " oh officer I was driving down this road and saw these pots in the street, I am moving them to my car so no one gets hurt, sorry about the noise". Then leave and return to Gaspars house, dump the pots in the road and drive away. Pots and pans are cheap. Buy them at any garage sale.When the council is awake all night, along with their neighbors, they will do something....

9:41 I think your idea is a great one and I hope everyone reads your suggestion and follows through with banging those pots and pans right outside the council members' homes at 2 a.m. Why should they get a good night's sleep?

6:41 I think 9:41 is indicating that you fight fire with fire. In the case of downtown, you fight noise with noise. At least that is the way I interpret it. It's a clever idea actually. I'm all for pots and pans banging.